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Vote on Desiree Davidson's Story
Were they afraid we were planning a coup d'etat?
I spent my first summer during Columbia Law School at a firm in Philadelphia described as one of the best places in the city for black lawyers. I believed that if there was any place where I would have an equal chance at opportunities, be treated fairly and succeed, this would be it. There were three black female summer associates out of sixty that year but any time all three of us were in an office talking, one of the partners would knock on the door to see how we were doing. It happened too often to be a coincidence that sometimes we would purposely agree to meet in so-and-so's office to test our theory that we were being monitored. Like clock work, ten minutes after we would get together a partner would stop by.
My boss used public humiliation to scrutinize me
Each Tuesday we had staff meetings where we would review each case. My boss would use those cases to identify individuals he wanted to scrutinize. One of the meetings, I was the person he wanted to scrutinize. He tried to take a case I was working on away from me because he never let a particular attorney work on a case for too long for fear we would develop relationships with clients, but I had a motion due the next day. So instead, he nit picked my work in front of every one.